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I'm back at work after a wonderful trip to the USA that included visiting Wall Street and the New York Stock Exchange. One doesn't have to spend much time on the streets of New York to be awed and inspired. Having said that, there's no place like home and it's great to be back. I hope you got a chance to take time out and enjoy the festivities too.

With 2014 behind us now is a good time to review our performance. Unlike other firms in SA, we publish and discuss the aggregate performance of our clients on an ongoing basis. We strive to be as transparent as possible so that clients can make educated and informed decisions before risking their hard earned money. It's unfortunate that other firms don't do the same; The truth is many would lose their business if they did. We're proud that we lead the industry in this respect, and we're committed to continue to do so.

QuantLab went live in April 2014 with a single client worth R150K. By the end of the year we grew our client base to R2.2 million. During the year our clients completed 530 trades, achieved a winning rate of 64.94% and successfully transacted R50 million through our platform. We're happy to report that every single one of our clients generated positive returns in their accounts by the end of the year. More significantly, our average client outperformed the JSE Top 40 index by +13.5% with lower levels of volatility. Furthermore, we outperformed the average hedge fund performance both locally and offshore. In terms of live trade statistics, we continue to see strong out-of-sample performance across the board, validating our ideas and approach. By every measure QuantLab has been a fantastic success up until this point, and we couldn't be more thrilled. Moving into the New Year, we'll continue to empower our clients with cutting edge technology and research so that they can achieve their financial goals.

Below is a quick summary of our live client performance for 2014. After a difficult month in November, our clients rebounded strongly in December finishing the year up +R106K. Seven out of the nine months produced positive gains, or a monthly winning rate of close to 80%.

The promise of the New Year brings in some exciting developments at QuantLab, one of which includes a new product that we hope to launch at the beginning of March. Smaller accounts, R5000 or more, seeking to employ a quantified approach to trading will find our new product of particular interest. Finer details will be revealed in the coming weeks, so be sure to stay tuned to learn more. Clients can expect to see improvements across the board in our flagship product, QuantLab, and possibly even additional strategies. One noteworthy change to better align our interests with clients can be seen in our new pricing policy. Provided certain conditions are met, we'll extend our clients a free subscription year if they do not generate positive returns that exceed our costs. In other words, QuantLab makes money only if you make money. No other research firm in SA offers clients a performance pegged payment structure like this. All round we have a very exciting year ahead of us and can't wait to get going.

We wish all our clients an abundant New Year. May 2015 be everything you hoped for and much more.

We start with the final phase of development this week: integrating QuantLab with the broker. Provided we don't run into any glitches, it's likely that QuantLab will be live and ready for real trading within 6 weeks. When QuantLab is fully functional I will start running weekly webinars discussing the service in detail. Once you've attended a webinar you will be provided with the opportunity to trial QuantLab for two weeks so you can get a first-hand feel of the service. We'll keep you posted with any new developments.

We've been hard at work developing and integrating a blog into QuantLab and are pleased to announce that our blog is now finally live. We'll be updating our blog with a variety of interesting articles including new research we're busy with, QuantLab events, information and education relating to QuantLab and much more. You'll be able to follow us across a host of social media environments as well, so you can be sure to stay connected. Until our first article, happy trading.

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About Us

QuantLab is a quantitative research house providing clients with access to cutting-edge investment methodologies through a web-based application. With over a decade's worth of experience in the financial industry, we have vast experience in building robust trading strategies. Our research is employed in live trading environments by a leading proprietary trading firm as well as an offshore hedge fund.

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We are in the process of developing longer-term trend following strategies that will further enhance diversification capabilities as well as return streams. We expect to release these
strategies into QuantLab during the course of the next 12 months.

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All information provided on www.quantlab.co.za is provided for educational purposes only. The employees or affiliates of www.quantlab.co.za may hold positions in the stocks discussed here. This information is NOT a recommendation or solicitation to buy or sell any securities. Your use of this and all information contained on www.quantlab.co.za is governed by the Terms and Conditions of Use.

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Disclaimer:

QuantLab is neither a registered investment advisor nor an investment advisory service and does not purport to tell or suggest which securities clients should buy or sell for themselves. All trading involves risk. Leveraged trading has large potential rewards, but also large potential risk. Be aware and accept this risk before trading. Never trade with money you cannot afford to lose. All forecasting is based on past performance and past performance of any trading methodology is no guarantee of future results. No "safe" trading system has ever been devised and no one can guarantee profits or freedom from loss. No representation is being made that any account will achieve profits or losses similar to those discussed. There is no guarantee that, even with the best advice available, you will become a successful trader because not everyone has what it takes to be a successful trader. The trading strategies discussed may be unsuitable for you depending upon your specific investment objectives and financial position. You must make your own investment decisions in light of your own investment objectives, risk profile, and circumstances. Use independent advisors as you believe necessary. Therefore, the information provided herein is not intended to be specific advice as to whether you should engage in a particular trading strategy or buy, sell, or hold any financial product. Margin requirements, tax considerations, commissions, and other transaction costs may significantly affect the economic consequences of the trading strategies or transactions discussed and you should review such requirements with your own legal, tax and financial advisors. Before engaging in such trading activities, you should understand the nature and extent of your rights and obligations and be aware of the risks involved. Your actions and the results of your actions in regard to anything you receive from QuantLab, www.quantlab.co.za, its managers, members, or affiliates are entirely your own responsibility. QuantLab cannot and will not assume liability for any losses that may be incurred by the use of any information received from this site, its managers, partners, and affiliates . Any such liability is hereby expressly disclaimed.

HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS HAVE MANY INHERENT LIMITATIONS, SOME OF WHICH ARE DESCRIBED BELOW. NO REPRESENTATION IS BEING MADE
THAT ANY ACCOUNT WILL OR IS LIKELY TO ACHIEVE PROFITS OR LOSSES SIMILAR TO THOSE SHOWN. IN FACT, THERE ARE FREQUENTLY SHARP
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS AND THE ACTUAL RESULTS SUBSEQUENTLY ACHIEVED BY ANY PARTICULAR TRADING PROGRAM.
ONE OF THE LIMITATIONS OF HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS IS THAT THEY ARE GENERALLY PREPARED WITH THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT.
IN ADDITION, HYPOTHETICAL TRADING DOES NOT INVOLVE FINANCIAL RISK, AND NO HYPOTHETICAL TRADING RECORD CAN COMPLETELY ACCOUNT FOR
THE IMPACT OF FINANCIAL RISK IN ACTUAL TRADING. FOR EXAMPLE, THE ABILITY TO WITHSTAND LOSSES OR TO ADHERE TO A PARTICULAR TRADING
PROGRAM IN SPITE OF TRADING LOSSES ARE MATERIAL POINTS WHICH CAN ALSO ADVERSELY AFFECT ACTUAL TRADING RESULTS. THERE ARE NUMEROUS
OTHER FACTORS RELATED TO THE MARKETS IN GENERAL OR TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF ANY SPECIFIC TRADING PROGRAM WHICH CANNOT BE FULLY
ACCOUNTED FOR IN THE PREPARATION OF HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS AND ALL OF WHICH CAN ADVERSELY AFFECT ACTUAL TRADING RESULTS.